Sharing is Caring – The Benefits of Business Collaborations

Cornwall is a place largely focused on community, so a collaboration of local, non-competitive businesses with similar audience demographics seemed like a fun way to kick off the summer holidays.

DairyLand Farmworld (farmtastic, free range fun) and Atlantic Reach (maximum fun for maximum value) both attract and are enjoyed by a similar audience – a match made in family-friendly, playground heaven.

The best ideas are (probably) born out silliness and laughter. It was a Friday afternoon when we came up with the Mascot Swap idea, right before things start spiralling towards the weekend.

Dazy and Boris, the furry, farmyard mascots at DairyLand, and children’s favourite Pirate Pete of Atlantic Reach, are iconic to their holiday attractions. Little ones love the mascots – posing for photos with them, greeting them on their explorations and searching them out on return visits.

What better way to advertise a collaboration competition than by merging the two well-known faces of the businesses?

So the plan was concocted; Dazy and Pirate Pete would make breaks for freedom from their own homes and experience life at the other business’ attraction; Dazy would spend the day lounging by the pool, playing golf and lunching at The Manor Arms, whilst Pirate Pete would take on the drop slides, bottle feed the baby animals and generally run riot in the farm park.

Our producer packed his cameras, bundled the costumes and work experience students in the van, and had all the filming, directing and running around nailed in four hours. A few more hours of editing later and we had our minute long meme-style video, ready to present to the world.

The aim was to inspire families to visit the businesses. Our perfectly silly film captured the essence of both attractions – a place for wholesome, family fun, where children can run around and adults can unwind.

We asked viewers to like, tag and share the post for their chance of winning the ultimate, family weekend of fun. We never thought our little Mascot Swap video, born out of a seemingly throwaway idea and Friday brain fever, could have such an impact…

The DairyLand and Atlantic Reach Mascot Swap collaboration film had reached over 150,000 people at time of writing, with almost 40,000 video views and over 6,000 reactions, comments and shares.

The reach was entirely organic, with no budget boosting it out to more people. By encouraging followers of each page to head over to the other to double their chances of winning, it increased traffic on both pages and each business gained engagement and followers as a result.

This collaboration between two popular, strong Cornish enterprises was a roaring success; born from a silly idea which was fun to create and a pleasure to present to the clients. All round smiles – from Idenna to clients to competition winners!

Would a local collaboration work your business? Get in touch with jo@idenna.com to learn more.